PGA Tour execs have "reached out to several media companies to gauge their interest in bidding for a package of rights or, potentially, helping the tour launch its own channel," according to Lombardo & Ourand of SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL. The Tour's deals with CBS and NBC run through '21, but both "allow the tour to open the contracts" in '18 to "modify some of the terms or to end the deals early, at the end of that year." The Tour is "locked in its deal with the Golf Channel" through '21 with no opt-out provision. Sources said that PGA Tour execs "have had informal talks with Fox, ESPN and Turner in recent weeks." Those talks were "described as preliminary, with some network executives privately expressing skepticism that the tour would opt out and change networks" after '18. PGA Tour officials are "studying whether the time is right for the tour to own a channel, either on cable or via" an OTT service. The Tour could potentially "cut a new Golf Channel deal that gives it a stake in the network." This would "follow the strategy Golf Channel parent NBC Sports Group has taken with its regional sports networks." It also "would be critical to the tour launching a channel" before '22. Content for the new channel "almost certainly would need to include some rights under contract to Golf Channel" through '21. Without a Golf Channel buy-in, the Tour "would have to wait until that deal expires to gain access to those rights." Industry execs note that the Tour's channel plan is "helped by its recent alliance with the LPGA that calls for the tour to negotiate the LPGA's domestic television rights" (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 5/16 issue).
